Confusing the concepts of being Scottish and being
Scott-ish, visitors often come to our clan tent at festivals and
gatherings seeking to
locate the clan for their particular surname. Responding to this
interest, many of our Clan representatives have materials on hand to
help these lost Scots find their clan. Continuing in this
tradition of helping fellow Scots find their heritage, we offer
information about other Scottish Clan organizations
on these web pages.

Underlined surnames below are linked to the home
page of a clan or family
surname organizations for that surname in the surname ranking lists
below. No significant attempt was made to
link sept (associated) surnames to their respective clan
organization's web site. Individual's web sites or genealogy
sites are typically not linked to any surname below.

Surnames not on these lists may appear below under the
heading of Clan and Family Name Organizations
as
do additional links to organization web sites for those
surnames
which have more than one active web site or organization. Be sure
to check this additional list to be certain you have found all
appropriate web sites for a surname.

Hint: Use
your browser's Find function to
search for the surname you're interested in. (Ctrl-F on most browsers)
If we have missed a clan or family name organization, please send the
link to our Webmaster.

Note that different spellings have not been added
together.
If they had been:

Mac/McDonald would come after Brown
Miller/ar would come after Scott
Johnston/e would come after Miller/ar
Mac/McLean would come after Clark
Mac/McLeod would come after Mac/McLean
Mac/McKenzie would come after Taylor
Mac/McKay would come after Mac/McKenzie.

All of the 'top 50' except McDonald, Kelly, McLean, Wallace
and Marshall were in the 'top 100' in 1858, and of the current 'second
50',
only Sutherland, White, Munro, Sinclair and MacLean were in the 'top
100' in
1858. This is a significant change in a relatively short time.

Below
is a brief extract from Black's 'Surnames of Scotland'
for the 150 Most Common
Scottish Surnames in the United States

Black states quite specifically that the Scottish
patronymic
is "Mac" and that he regards the contraction to "Mc" or
"M' " as incorrect. This, no
doubt, will annoy many a good Scot, both at home and overseas!

Webmaster's Note:
Mac is the same word as the Gaelic word "meic" meaning "son of" and was
used to
identify someone, like "son of Dougall," before MacDougall was a
surname. "Mc" is an abbreviation of "Mac". It was written with an
apostrophe or two dots below the "c" or other ways, to show that the
full "Mac" was shortened. "M'" is the same. There is no
significance if Mc or Mac or M' are used. Some people will tell
you Mc is Irish and Mac is Scottish. This isn't true. The "O'"s (e.g.
O'Sullivan) are strictly Irish so any in Scotland probably can trace
their ancestors back to 19th century Irish immigrants. But "Mc" and
"Mac" are found in both countries. In some cases, leaving off the
"Mac" all together may have occurred somewhere along the way, so
someone with the surname MacDonald ("son of Donald") is of the same
global family as another person with the surname Donald. So, when
looking for a surname organization or doing genealogy research, be sure
to look for the other forms of the surname.

102.
Leslie/Lesley - territorial, from the lands of Leslie, which are said
to have
been named after Laszlo, the servant of Queen Margaret
(Hungarian). The spelling Lesley is almost unknown in
Scotland except as a girl's given name.

Those surnames which have a clan
or family name association with a web site are listed below in
alphabetical order by surname. Also, those with multiple clan
or family name associations are listed with additional web site
locations. For completeness, all names with a family name
organization are listed below - even those listed and linked
above.

Because of the migrations of the
Scots and the Irish,
some Irish surname organizations appear here and are marked with a "i".
For simplicity, all "Mc" names are shown with "Mac." If we have
missed a clan or family name organization, please send the link to our Web Master.

Scottish District Families
AssociationA study of Scotland shows that approximately seventy
percent of
all the families of Scotland and their descendants were not affiliated
with, or members of, the ancient Scottish Clans.